Gucci Mane

Gucci Mane has enjoyed writing poem since he was in elementary school but did not begin rapping until he was 14. In 2005, he released an indie album "Trap House" which featured "Icy", a successful duet with Young Jeezy. Despite the success of the song, the two didn't follow up their collaboration with another duet as they were involved in disputes over the rights to the single, which eventually caused a rift between the two artists.

In that same year, Gucci was charged with murder after one of her companions fired at a group of men who were trying to steal his trademark "So Icey" chain. He pleaded not guilty, reasoning only having a self defense. While the case, which was eventually dropped in January 2006 due to insufficient evidence, was still on investigation, he was hit by another legal issue, cited of assaulting a nightclub promoter and granted a six-month prison sentence for the assault. He was released from jail in the same month of his murder case was dismissed.

Nine months after being a free man, Gucci returned to the studio to make new music for his second studio album "Hard to Kill" which was dropped in October. The album peaked at No. 4 on Billboard Top Independent Albums chart and cracked Billboard Hot 200, climbing to No. 76. The selling number of the album slightly surpassed its predecessor with 165,000 copies.

2007 saw Gucci releasing two studio albums, one is a major-label release under Atlantic Record and the other is an indie effort. He brought forward the indie album "Trap-A-Thon" in October and followed it up with a major-label record "Back to the Trap House" two months later. In "Back to the Trap House", he collaborated with Lil' Kim, Ludacris, The Game, Trey Songz, LoToya Luckett and Shawnna.

In November 2009 during when he planned to release another studio album, Gucci was sentenced to 12 months in jail for violating probation which was stemmed from the 2006 assault case. However, he thought there was nothing to worry about saying, "It was a challenge for me. I'm just happy my team kept my music going strong for me. And I'm happy I recorded so many records so people could hear me."

His second major release, "The State vs. Radric Davis", is released across U.S. on December 8. He gets support from Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Keyshia Cole, Plies, Cam'ron and Soulja Boy among others as featured guests. "Murder Was the Case", his fourth indie album, meanwhile, arrived in May in the same year.